


Expenses

by TheBreakfastGenie



Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-15
Updated: 2016-01-15
Packaged: 2018-05-14 01:11:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,020
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5723893
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheBreakfastGenie/pseuds/TheBreakfastGenie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Alexander has to pay for Philip's overdue library book. Philip is dead. Pure angst, inspired by a tumblr post.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Expenses

**Author's Note:**

> I saw this post last night and I was very inspired:  
> http://publius-esquire.tumblr.com/post/137055612155/the-implication-that-hamilton-had-to-pay-for-a
> 
> This is the first Hamilton fic I've written and I'm very excited. I have a lengthy project I'm working on and didn't think I'd get anything up in the meantime. I'm considering writing a historical fic about this event too, but the modern AU came to me more easily. Feedback is greatly appreciated, especially since this is my first fic in this fandom!
> 
> I rated this General Audiences because I don't feel the content warrants a Teen rating, but there are a few instances of strong language.

They start about a week after the funeral. No one in their house has taken any calls since it happened, instead they ignore the ringing and just let the answering machine get it. If it’s Angelica sometimes Eliza calls back. He never returns the calls. He hasn’t spoken to anyone in weeks except for Eliza, and even that’s hardly been enough to count. They’ve exchanged words, they haven’t really talked. Talking hurts too much. 

Alexander hears the phone ring and waits, counting. Seven. It’s seven rings before their machine picks up. He committed that number to memory on the first day when the sympathy calls started coming, but he still counts every time. He vaguely remembers setting the phone to the maximum number of rings right after he bought it, so he would have time to finish his thoughts if the phone rang while he was writing, but that seems only a distant memory now. 

He hasn’t picked up a pen since it happened. For the first time since he can remember, he doesn’t have any words. For the first time in his life he has found himself in a situation he can’t write his way out of. 

_One, two, three, four, five, six, seven—_

_*click*_

He waits. One of them always listens to the messages, at least the beginning, to find out what they are. He knows if he doesn’t do it Eliza will and he can’t stomach the thought of her doing it every time, without any help from him. God knows he already has enough to feel guilty about, he doesn’t need to add another sin to the pile. 

“ _This is a message for Philip Hamilton—”_

He slams his hand down on the delete button so hard he’s surprised he doesn’t break it. He doubles over, his hands clenched into fists, he breathes hard. He is filled with a sudden anger—how _dare_ they, how dare they ask for _him_ —but it’s not enough to fill the pit in his stomach. He feels like crying. 

For a moment he thinks he _will_ cry, but he doesn’t. He just sits in the office chair, motionless, waiting for the room to stop spinning, for the world to regain some equilibrium. 

It doesn’t. It hasn’t since the day he heard the words “ _Mr. Hamilton, your son has been shot._ ” 

The first coherent thought he manages to form is _thank God he deleted it before Eliza could hear it_. 

The calls keep coming. Once a day at first, then twice. He spends more time by the phone now, so he can be the one to catch them. Every time he thinks about leaving he imagines Eliza, looking the way he did when he heard the first one. He doesn’t think he could stand it. After a couple of days, he begins to notice a pattern to when they come in, (between 10 and 10:30 in the morning and, later on, between 2:45 and 3:15 in the afternoon) which makes it easier. 

If Eliza notices the change in his behavior she doesn’t say anything, not to him or to Angelica. He doesn’t think she notices. She doesn’t seem to notice much, these days. He can’t blame her. He wishes he didn’t notice anything at all. 

At first he listens to the beginning of the message ( _“This is a message for—”_ ). Eventually he starts to recognize the number, and deletes the call as soon as he sees (917)-275-6975 flash up on the screen. This goes on for nearly a month. 

He doesn’t ask himself (or God, or Eliza, or anyone) who would be calling his dead son. He doesn’t ask why they could be calling. He doesn't need to know. He doesn’t care. He hates them for doing it and that’s not going to change. 

Finally, one day, he’s had enough. 

Finally, one day, he answers. 

He doesn’t even wait out all seven rings. In a sudden burst of either courage or fury, he snatches it up on the second ring. 

_One… two…_

_*click*_

“This is a message for—” 

He screams, actually screams, into the receiver. 

“What the _fuck_ do you want?” 

There is silence, for a moment. A pause. 

“Are you Philip Hamilton?” a voice asks cautiously. 

It's a young voice, a young, female voice. Under other circumstances, Alexander might have felt bad about screaming at her. Under these circumstances, Alexander feels nothing. 

But then he pictures Angelica, his little Angelica, and he sighs. 

“I’m sorry about the…” the what? How could he explain it? “I’m his father,” he says finally. 

“Could I speak to Philip?” she asks, still cautious. 

“Philip is dead.” 

He winces at his own bluntness. He can practically hear the girl on the other end of the line go pale. 

“I’m so sorry, Mr. Hamilton.” 

He tries to muster up the strength to squeak out a hoarse thank you, but he fails. He hopes she doesn’t mind. 

“What did you want to speak to Philip about?” he finally manages. “You weren’t… one of his friends, were you?” 

He’d had such a hard time keeping track of all of Philip’s friends. Especially the girls. 

“Oh!” she sounds surprised. “No, um… I’m from the New York City Public Library.” 

That’s when it hits him. 

_(917)-275-6975_

Alexander has had the number for the New York City Public Library memorized for thirty years. 

He can’t believe, these past few weeks, he hasn’t once recognized it. 

From what he understands from within his isolation, people are beginning to say that he has gotten old, that it has aged him. Maybe they’re right. He certainly has more gray hair than he used to. 

“Oh,” he says, because he doesn’t know what to say. He knows what’s coming next. Every member of his family (those old enough to read, anyway) has gotten this message a dozen times. It’s practically a Hamilton rite of passage. 

“Um,” she says. “I’m so sorry but… I was calling to tell you—well, Philip, really—that a copy of _Songs of Innocence and of Experience_ by William Blake is now several weeks overdue…” 

Alexander sighs. 

“We usually leave several messages..." the girl continues. 

“I didn't listen to them,” Alexander admits. 

For a moment, neither of them speaks, but he can feel her understanding in the silence. 

“I’ll, um, can you hold for a minute?” the girl asks. 

He doesn't answer but she must take his silence as assent because she disappears but doesn’t end the call. 

He waits through two segments of irritating music and a reminder of the library’s hours and special programs before the girl’s voice comes back.  

“Mr. Hamilton, I’m so sorry, I asked my boss if we could waive the fee, given the circumstances, but he said the system just doesn’t allow—”  

She’s abruptly cut off as the phone on her end is seized from her and her kind, gentle voice is replaced by a rough, male one. 

“Mr. Hamilton, my name is Henry Caritat. I am the manager of the main branch of the New York Public Library.” 

Alexander doesn’t say anything. 

“Sir, I understand that this must be a difficult time for you, but library policy is very clear. All books must be returned, unless you wish to pay for the entire cost of the book, and all fines must be paid in full, preferably at the time of return. The fine on your son's overdue item currently totals twelve dollars and sixty-eight cents.” 

Alexander hates the way Caritat over-enunciates the amount, as if he expects his patrons to be too stupid to understand him, but only cares about whether they understand exactly how much money they owe him. Alexander decides then and there that Henry Caritat is a sorry excuse for a librarian. 

“The library is open from—” 

“I know your fucking _hours_ ,” Alex growls, cutting him off. “You’ll get your damn book.” 

He hangs up the phone violently, slamming it into the cradle with a force he hasn't used since he had to take conference calls with Thomas Jefferson.  

Alexander breathes hard for a minute, glaring daggers at the phone. Not that the phone has done anything wrong, except forcing him to speak to that repulsive man. 

Eventually, he leaves the room. He walks down the hall slowly, quietly, as if he’s afraid of getting caught. As if it’s a crime to go where he is going. Or maybe he’s just afraid of catching Eliza’s eye as she realizes he is walking to Philip’s room. 

Philip never lived in this room, of course, Philip never even lived in this house, but when they packed up his childhood bedroom they’d had to do something with his belongings, and neither one of them could bare to throw them out. So Alexander had found an empty room upstairs and shoved everything in there, behind a closed door. 

He finds himself staring at that same closed door now, willing himself to have the strength to open it. The longer he hesitates, though, the more he fears Eliza will find him, and eventually that anxiety overcomes his reluctance. Tentatively, he turns the brass knob and lets the door swing open.  

The room is cold and drafty—why bother to check the heat if no one ever goes in?—and as soon as he steps inside he is surrounded by boxes. About a dozen of them, just beginning to gather a thin layer of dust. They’d never been able to unpack them. 

Alexander finds the box he’s looking for right away, near the door. All of Philip’s things from his dorm room at Columbia had been haphazardly packed into two very large cardboard boxes, taped shut, and mailed to the grieving parents, eventually arriving unceremoniously on their doorstep. 

Alexander had lugged the boxes into the house and up the stairs, thrown them into the room, and slammed the door shut behind them. It was the only time the door had been opened since he filled the room. 

One of the boxes contained mostly clothes, the other the rest of Philip’s personal effects. They weren’t labelled, but he could tell by the weight which one was which. He gives each one a nudge of his foot. One spins on the smooth wooden floor and slides a few inches, coming to an abrupt stop when it knocks into another box. The other barely budges.  

Alexander kneels down beside the offending box. He didn’t think to bring his pocket knife and rather than go back for it he rips at the clear tape with his fingers until he can pull the flaps open. 

There it sits, right on the top. Alexander recognizes the stiff plastic dust jacket that is the hallmark of a library book immediately, before he even notices the title. _Songs of Innocence and of Experience_. 

Gingerly, Alexander lifts the book from the box. A tiny, thin piece of paper flutters with the movement. The paper is sticking out of the top of the book, somewhere near the middle of the pages. 

The library receipt. Philip had made a habit, since childhood, of using library receipts to mark his place. Eliza had always said he must have picked that up from Alexander, who would repurpose any stray piece of paper as a bookmark, but Alexander always saw it as Philip’s alone. 

Ignoring the now past date on the receipt, he opens the book to the page it was on. Page 63. His eyes find the title of the poem, moving of their own accord. _A Little Boy Lost._ Automatically, against his will, he finds himself reading it.  

He makes it to the penultimate stanza, but when he reads the words “ _the weeping parents wept in vain_ ” he slams the book shut. He backs quickly out of the room, clutching the volume to his chest, not bothering to close the box from Columbia. No one will see it anyway. He pulls the door shut as he exits, not satisfied until he hears it latch. 

Shaken but still determined, Alexander goes downstairs. He thinks he sees Eliza in the kitchen as he passes but he doesn't stop to tell her where he’s going. He finds his jacket hanging on its peg by the door and shrugs it on, checking that his wallet is in the pocket. He goes outside, closing the door behind him but not bothering to lock it. He's not even sure if he has his key. 

It’s a long walk to the library from their new house uptown, but Alexander sets off walking anyway. As he walks, he finds himself returning to an old college habit of muttering to himself. It helps him now, as it did then, to organize his thoughts.  

At first he is overwhelmed with thoughts of Philip, thoughts he does not want to think, thoughts he has been trying for weeks now to avoid. 

The police, their explanation of what happened blurring with the police report he had insisted on reading (over Eliza’s strong objections), desperate to understand what had happened, searching the facts for some kind of answer, some kind of _reason_. 

_“It was one of his classmates… they had a disagreement, political… other students said the disagreement became personal when Eaker insulted his family… specifically his father… The next day on the way to the class Eaker pulled out a gun as soon as he saw him…”_

The hospital room, the doctor trying to explain to him why the prognosis was so grim, Alexander screaming back at him, unable to believe it, unable to comprehend it. He had taken his share of anatomy courses in college—he’d once considered medical school, after all—but none of that knowledge made any sense when he was looking at his unconscious son in a hospital bed and the doctor was telling him they couldn’t _fix_ him. 

_“I’m sorry, Mr. Hamilton, we’re doing everything we can, but he has a very quick-moving infection…”_

_“Don’t you have antibiotics? What is this, fucking 1800?”_

_“We’ve been administering antibiotics since he arrived but so far he hasn’t responded… like I said, the infection is very fast-moving and it’s possible it’s a resistant strain… his body just may not be strong enough to fight it off.”_

But soon his thoughts turn to other things, to Philip’s first day at Columbia… to Philip, nine years old, stumbling through the numbers in French and following Eliza’s lead at the piano… to Philip, a newborn, being gently placed in his arms, Alexander terrified even to breathe on something so small and delicate. 

So he begins to speak, uncertain if he’s speaking to himself or to Philip, talking about anything at all. Sooner than he expected he finds himself in front of the public library. He briefly considers just leaving the book in the dropbox and going home, but he can’t leave money there and it’s suddenly deeply important to him that the fee is paid.  

He takes the book with him and gets into line. There are ten checkout desks working today, and almost half of them are staffed by girls. He can’t see them well, he has no idea which, if any of them, is the one who placed the call. 

Eventually, it is his turn. He is called to a desk at the far end of the room, with one of the girls. He studies her, but he cannot tell if she is the one.  

“I’m here to return this book,” he says, placing _Songs of Innocence and of Experience_ on the counter. She frowns. 

“Sir, there is a book return over—” she raises a finger to point to the other side of the lobby. He stops her.  

“It’s overdue. I need to pay a fine,” he explains. She looks at him for a moment, as if debating lecturing him on proper book return procedure (as if he doesn’t _know_ ) but in the end she acquiesces. 

“Okay,” she says and takes _Songs of Innocence and of Experience_ from him. 

She scans it. He would tell her that she doesn’t need to, that he knows how much the total is, but he is distracted by analyzing her voice, trying to decide if she is the kind girl he spoke to on the phone. He decides that she is not. Her voice sounds different, and besides, he thinks the girl would have recognized the title of the book when she saw it. He wishes he had bothered to ask her name.  

“Your total fine is $12.68,” she says, unnecessarily.  

Alexander opens his wallet, but finds only one bill inside. It’s a ten. Maybe he has enough change to cover the remaining two dollars and sixty-eight cents. 

As soon as he opens the change pocket he knows that he doesn’t. He has one quarter, a dime, and two pennies. Thirty-eight cents. Nowhere near enough. 

He checks the inner pocket of his jacket and is relieved to find his checkbook with him. He tears a check from it and takes out his pen (he never goes anywhere without one). Alexander dates the check and writes in his neat but harried hand _12.68. Twelve and 68/100. New York City Public Library._ In the “for” line he squeezes in _“the payment of Philip Hamilton’s outstanding balance.”_ He hands the girl the check and the book and he leaves.  

As he begins the walk home of nearly one hundred blocks, he takes out his check register, which he always carries with his checkbook, to write in this latest withdrawal. (He long ago mastered the art of writing while walking.) He fills in the amount and the date with ease, but pauses at the description of the transaction. He walks five blocks staring at the page, looking up only to ensure his safety when crossing the street (for Eliza’s sake). At last he writes simply “Expenses _Caritat_ ,” emphasizing the name, thinking of the cruel man who denied his employee’s request to waive the small fine for the sake of a grieving father. Then he thinks of his son and his habit of returning library books late and adds in parentheses, “(Philip).” 

**Author's Note:**

> -Look up William Blake's poem A Little Boy Lost. It's about a boy being sacrificed. Also, the poem on the next page in Songs of Innocence and of Experience is A Little Girl Lost, which should give you all kinds of Angelica Hamilton feels. 
> 
> -1800 is presumably the year Philip Hamilton dies in the musical, since he dies before the election of 1800. In reality, he died in 1801.
> 
> -That is the real number for the New York City Public Library. Please do not call it. 
> 
> if you want you can hit me up on tumblr, I'm thebreakfastgenie there too. I'm always happy to talk!


End file.
